Get Ready Everybody

I encourage everyone to read Josh's posts below. In fact I'm probably going to be forwarding them to some people because he made his case very strongly. Another thing I want to recognize is that scandal aspect of all of this and the part the American voter plays. Of course I must be unamurican for bringing up the way the world sees us as a "global test" to our values, but at the end of the day, our country is surrounded by the rest of the world, and if we want a peaceful world with less terrorism, we need to make the world know what we feel is right and wrong.
Bush's stance on the abuses of Abu Graib was wrong. If you vote for George W. Bush, you're telling the world it was okay.
The lack of effort to stop Zarquawi BEFORE we invaded Iraq was the fault of the Bush White House. Zarquawi is now beheading people left and right and only last week did we make attempts to stop his funding. If you vote for George W. Bush, you tell the world that Zarquawi wasn't a threat, Iraq was.
The removal of the US from several international treaties was direct result of a lack of global diplomacy on the part of the administration coupled with a do it ourselves attitude that weakened our allies support across the board(including Poland, read their newspapers). If you vote for George W. Bush, you tell the world you agree with unilateral military action, nuclear weapons testing, no universal judicial body for international crimes, no international labor laws, no international environmental guidelines, and no outside watchdog commissions for election procedures here or abroad.
The war in Iraq increased the number of Al Queda members. Increased the threat on American soldiers and civilians of all nations across the globe. If you vote for George W. Bush, you think the world is safer because we've removed a tyrant dictator with no direct access to weapons systems, no plans to even invade his neighboring countries, and little ability to operate while constantly under the sanctions of the UN as opposed to a religious zealot with an army of suicidal terror experts just waiting for the next opportunity to prove their existence to the world.

This brings me to another quick point. Bush wants you to feel that we are hated by the islamic community or that we are hated by the "terrorists". What we need to keep in perspective here is that this is not a war against an enemy, it's a war against a conceptual way to make a statement. Terrorists are not a group, an organization, a religious entity; They are activists making a statement for typically political purpose. Now this doesn't mean that we should pay close attention to giving in to the demands of these individuals in order to save our tails for another day. What it means is that we will never ever ever ever ever eliminate terrorism unless we miraculously achieve global peace. And even then you're determined to have a dissenter that has the ability to become disenfranchised to the point of desperation. Now there's an overwhelming popularity for terrorism because the trend has dominated the global debate. Think of it from a third world perspective. You're broke, your family is broke and by broke I don't mean you don't have money, you don't have anything. There are armed gangs of various sorts stealing from you as often as the armed government officials. You understand that much of the world looks down on you and you get angry at others that have more. An easy target is the US or Britain or really any decently civilized nation because you read in the papers how they patronize your struggle. You also see on the news over and over again how these terrorists are a threat to those nations and you know that right down the street there's a group of zealots with a purpose against the west and not only do they have guns to protect themselves from the gangs and the government, they have food and shelter and money. Tell me the easy choice is to mind your own business and continue to suffer. It's the worst of viscious circles. We need to make a stance against terrorism, but in doing so we make it more popular to those that dissent from our views. The difference between the Kerry concept and the Bush doctrine is the only possiblity out of this circle. Instead of continuing to do whatever the hell we feel like and invading whomever we deem worthy, we utilize the global efficiency of our allies and we make intelligent strategic decisions. In other words, we don't assume anything. It's a global test, not that we allow other nations to prevent us from protecting ours, but that we utilize the opinions of the world to make a smarter decision. Personally, I'm an advocate for less international interference, but I agree with both sides of that coin. I think much of our problems internationally stem from reactions to us sticking our noses in everyone's business. The biggest problem this caused in this recent Bush era is that we stuck our noses where it didn't belong and thumbed our nose where it did. We ignored the progressive steps that Clinton had started with Europe to better unite the world and botched up two nations with the precept that we're after the people that destroyed two of our buildings. Would you appreciate being an Iraqi who's entire village was practically wiped out in our envasion of Baghdad only to hear on the news that it was in defense of two skyscapers? No, you wouldn't. Our entire problem internationally is that we don't look at the perspective of the nations we're dealing with. Listen to Bush's speeches. We're bringing freedom to these people and they want it. There are businesses in Iraq that are hiring people. Well who in the hell ever said that everyone in the world wants our particular brand of freedom and who says that our capitalist ways are the best ways for a small country with one large resource to control their assets? Take the statement the other day with Bush supporting ANYONE that is elected democratically. Well just because an idealogy is voted doesn't make that leader a democratic one. Every member of the Kremlin was voted into office. Dictators stage elections to appease the common people everyday. Let's stop acting like 3 year olds folks, let's get with a program that has some smarts behind it. Let's try an administration that is at least planning to think before it acts and at least is talking about getting help first.